Born on February 22, 1892...Died on October 19, 1950
She was born in Rockland, Maine and died in "Steepletop" in Austerlitz, New York
Millay spent most of her adult years in New York City.
Her parents Henery Tollman Millay and Cora (Buzzelle) Millay divorced over financial iresponsibilitly and her mother moved with her daughters to Camden, Maine
In high school she entered some juvenile pieces in the St. Nicholas Magazine
She attended one semester at Benard College then entered Vassar College in 1913
She first married Arthur Davison Ficke and later married Eugen Jan Boissevain in 1923 and they never had children.
While in New York Millay acted in Greenwich Village
Millay was slightly involved in the Sacco-Vanzetti case in 1927, she started a protest called "Justice Denied in Massachusetts." Her involvement in the protest was evidence of her long-standing sympathy for the socialists aspects in communism.
Millay was known for her style of rhyming and imagery.
Her poems focused alot on death ans natural things and nature.
Millay worte over 200 sonnets and lyric poems.
She was a proponent to Woman's Rights and was Laureate of the General Foundation for Woman's Rights
She was elected to the National Institute of Arts and Letters
Some of her influences were Floyd Dell, Arthur Davison Ficke, and Witter Bynner
After Millay married she suffered a nervous breakdown where she couldn't write for two years. Her husband catered to her but she soon became a drunk and after her husband died of a stroke she died alone on an empty staircase in "Steepletop" on October 19, 1950
Works of Millay
Renascence and other poems
A Few Fig from Thistles
The Harp-Weaver and Other Poems
Huntsman, What Quarry?
The Buck in the Snow
Wine from These Grapes
Conversation at Midnight
Make Bright the Arrows:1940 Notebook
The Murder of Ludice
Second April
Mine the Harvest
"First Fig"
"Second Fig"
"The Pigeons"
Ashes of Life Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike;
Eat I must, and sleep I will, -- and would that night were here!
But ah! -- to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike!
Would that it were day again! -- with twilight near!
Love has gone and left me and I don't know what to do;
This or that or what you will is all the same to me;
But all the things that I begin I leave before I'm through, --
There's little use in anything as far as I can see.
Love has gone and left me, -- and the neighbors knock and borrow,
And life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse, --
And to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow
There's this little street and this little house.
Sorrow Sorrow likea ceaseless rain
Beats upon my heart.
People twist and scream in pain, --
Dawn will find them still again;
This has neither wax nor wane,
Neither stop nor start.
People dress and go to town;
I sit in my chair.
All my thoughts are slow and brown:
Standing up or sitting down
Little matters, or what gown
Or what shoes I wear.
The Little Ghost
I knew her for a little ghost
That in my garden walked;
The wall is high -- higher than most --
And the green gate was locked.
And yet I did not think of that
Till after she was gone --
I knew her by the broad white hat,
All ruffled, she had on.
By the dear ruffles round her feet,
By her small hands that hung
In their lace mitts, austere and sweet,
Her gown's white folds among.
I watched to see if she would stay,
What she would do -- and oh!
She looked as if she liked the way
I let my garden grow!
She bent above my favourite mint
With conscious garden grace,
She smiled and smiled -- there was no hint
Of sadness in her face.
She held her gown on either side
To let her slippers show,
And up the walk she went with pride,
The way great ladies go. And where the wall is built in new
And is of ivy bare
She paused -- then opened and passed through
A gate that once was there.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Works of Millay
Ashes of Life
Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike;
Eat I must, and sleep I will, -- and would that night were here!
But ah! -- to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike!
Would that it were day again! -- with twilight near!
Love has gone and left me and I don't know what to do;
This or that or what you will is all the same to me;
But all the things that I begin I leave before I'm through, --
There's little use in anything as far as I can see.
Love has gone and left me, -- and the neighbors knock and borrow,
And life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse, --
And to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow
There's this little street and this little house.
Sorrow
Sorrow like a ceaseless rain
Beats upon my heart.
People twist and scream in pain, --
Dawn will find them still again;
This has neither wax nor wane,
Neither stop nor start.
People dress and go to town;
I sit in my chair.
All my thoughts are slow and brown:
Standing up or sitting down
Little matters, or what gown
Or what shoes I wear.
The Little Ghost
I knew her for a little ghost
That in my garden walked;
The wall is high -- higher than most --
And the green gate was locked.
And yet I did not think of that
Till after she was gone --
I knew her by the broad white hat,
All ruffled, she had on.
By the dear ruffles round her feet,
By her small hands that hung
In their lace mitts, austere and sweet,
Her gown's white folds among.
I watched to see if she would stay,
What she would do -- and oh!
She looked as if she liked the way
I let my garden grow!
She bent above my favourite mint
With conscious garden grace,
She smiled and smiled -- there was no hint
Of sadness in her face.
She held her gown on either side
To let her slippers show,
And up the walk she went with pride,
The way great ladies go.
And where the wall is built in new
And is of ivy bare
She paused -- then opened and passed through
A gate that once was there.
.